I heard of the ‘black boy’ for the first time when I came to live in the UK.  I worked in a garden centre in London. One day two of the other employees came back from a plant buying foray and spoke of this amazing plant they had seen, an odd thing with a rough black stem and a tuft of square fibre optic-like leaves.  I had no idea what it might be but it sounded pretty incredible, so I looked it up in the encyclopedia. I found nothing under ‘black boy’.  I wasn’t surprised, common names are pretty useless in a botanical context.  I went on the World Wide Web and there I found it, the amazing plant more correctly known as Xanthorrhoea.  An Australian fellow of superb architectural qualities!  Why hadn’t I heard of it before?  It must be rare, tender or difficult to grow I thought.  As it turns out, it’s all of these and very slow growing, too.  No wonder the one sighted at the “wholesale” nursery was £995.00 (USD $1500.00)! Doing a bit of research, I found that there are 28 species of Xanthorrhoea, all native to Australia.  They were once linked to lilies but are now put in their own family, Xanthorrhoeaceae.  They have tall spikes of tiny star-shaped flowers that come out from the centre of the crowns. Australia yields many strange plants but this has to be the most peculiar of them all!

I searched, mostly in vain, for the black boy here in England.  Kew Gardens was the only place I saw it, but only in its juvenile stemless stage.  It was only more recently that I had the joy of acquainting myself properly with it. I visited Australia for the first time four years ago and saw a few plants in man-made landscapes but it was only last winter on my second visit that I had the chance to see them in the wild.  I spent a lot of time touring around this wonderful continent and wherever I went they seemed to  greet me with friendly regularity.

I started my journey in Melbourne.  A kindred soul took me to the beautiful Cranbourne Botanical Garden, a satellite garden of the Melbourne Botanical Garden, to the south-east of the city. It is a young, modern institution with the most interesting landscape and collection of native Australian plants, a gem for the inquisitive horticulturist and botanist alike. There were many exciting plants to get enthusiastic about, but the stars of the garden were without a doubt the astonishing, ancient Xanthorrhoea, X. preissii and X.  johnstonii, some of which were 800 + years old.  They were the tallest specimens one is ever likely to encounter I think! These had been uprooted and replanted into the botanical garden, but they looked totally at home in this great landscape.

Then I made my way to Tasmania.  I knew very little of this mysterious island and I had no expectations of it but what a nice surprise it turned out to be!  It is the most beautiful, rugged place in the world – a naturalist’s paradise. I visited the Freycinet Peninsula on the eastern coast, a place replete with white sandy beaches, aquamarine seas, amazing rock formations and a unique flora that included the grass trees.   There was X. australis, our original ‘black boy’ but also the ground hugging X. arenaria.  Unfortunately, we also saw many rather sad looking ones, a few dea, too.  We read with great horror that a root rot is attacking the populations and that there is very little that can be done about it, but hope that some will prove resistant.  For plants with such slow growing metabolisms, it does not abide very well.

In Sydney, I stayed with a friend in the northern suburbs of the city and taking the dog for a walk, we came upon dozens of Xanthorrohoeas growing in thickets under Angophora and Eucalyptus trees.  I am not quite sure which species it was, perhaps X. macronema? They had short trunks and were lush looking.  My friend called them grass trees rather than black boys (which is the more commonly used name for “black boy” is seen as a racist name), which seemed to make sense, as they weren’t black at all.  She explained that it is forest fires that burns their leaves, turning their trunks black but that in this valley, amidst a city suburb, fire is prevented and the grass trees keep their leaves as a skirt.

The last place where I saw a Xanthorrohea was in front of a holiday resort in Port Douglas, in the north east of Queensland, some 16 degrees from the equator.  I was really surprised to find them growing in such a hot and humid climate, having seen them in the dry south previously. They must be pretty adaptable plants! Adaptable, yes, but not enough to grow in the cold British climate. Here one has to contend with their plastic version; the fibre optic lamp! - Philippe

Last month, I travelled to St. Louis for the annual meeting of the American Professional Gardens Association (APGA).  Going to St. Louis in any of the summer months is definitely risky business, since the heat and humidity levels can be intolerable.  Climatically, St. Louis lived up to its reputation. The prediction for one day, in particular, was a heat index of 115.  I had been to St. Louis at least 20 years ago, on a couple different occasions when I was a summer intern at the Chicago Botanic Garden and then again when I was a student at Southern Illinois University (southeast of St. Louis).  On both trips, I visited the Missouri Botanical Gardens.  My faded memories left me with the feeling that I liked my experience, but not much more than that.

This year the Missouri Botanical Garden is celebrating its 150th anniversary.  The garden was started in 1859 and is the nation’s oldest botanic garden in continuous operation.  Recognized by the National Historic Landmark, the Missouri Botanical Garden or MOBOT for short is truly both a botanical and historical gem.  The 79 acre garden includes a geodesic dome conservatory, the unique Climatron, which houses one of the world’s largest collections of rare and endangered orchids.  The Climatron is also the world’s first geodesic dome greenhouse.

During this journey west,  I made two trips to the Botanical Garden.  On my first excursion, I had an appointment to meet with one of the world’s leading aroid experts, Dr. Thomas Croat.  Pam Allenstein, the NAPCC manager and I arrived to meet with Dr. Croat to discuss the possibility of making MOBOT’s aroid collection a national collection through the NAPCC(North American Plant Collections Consortium).  Dr. Croat is one of Missouri’s most celebrated scientists and plant collector.  He has been collecting aroids for over 41 years.  In late 2007, Dr. Croat collected the six millionth herbarium specimen for the Missouri Botanic Garden! Their herbarium is the second largest in the Western Hemisphere and the fifth largest in the world.  The herbarium enlarges by 123,000specimens per year and includes collections from around the world including collections made by Charles Darwin and Joseph Banks, who was on James Cook’s first voyage around the world (1768-1771).

My second visit revealed the wealth of horticulture held at the Missouri Botanical Garden.  One of their treasures is the Linnean House, which is the oldest continually operated greenhouse west of the Mississippi River, housing many permanent tender plants.  Upon entering the garden, there are massive pools which display dozens of floating orbs created by artist, Dale Chihuly.  The use of annuals, tropicals and tender perennials is truly provocative and impressive.  There are significant “high-Victorian” bedding out schemes throughout the garden ,especially around several brick Victorian buildings and includes a highly stylized floral clock.

Today, the Missouri Botanical Garden is a unique place that finds its self representing ornamental horticulture in its broadest sense while engaging in botanical and conservation scientific pursuits around the globe.  At the helm is world renowned botanist, Dr. Peter Raven who has directed MOBOT for the last 25 years.  His international awards, committee and accomplishments are too numerous to list, but include the Scott Medal awarded by the Scott Arboretum of Swarthmore College, PA, USA;  U. S. National Medal of Science; Named a Hero for the Planet by TIME Magazine and is Member of the National Geographic board of trustees.- Andrew

Last time, I introduced my love of the partnership of the colors blue and yellow. Its a riff, I’ve been exploring in my own garden and well as client’s. Luckily, springtime if full of plants that have blue or yellow flowers. The world of spring-flowering bulbs is full of blue and yellow flowers. Both colors are more than welcome, after the dull days of winter and the drab landscape. Here forget-me-nots mingle with Narcissus ‘Hawera’.

Pansies too, come in many shades of blue, from pale milky-blue to almost cobalt. Here’s an early container combination of a blue pansy with Narcissus ‘Bravoure’.

Don’t forget to add bulbs to colored emerging perennial foliage to create early-season combinations. Here the bright chartreuse shoots of Lysimachia nummularia ‘Aurea’ begin to spread beneath Muscari aucheri ‘Blue Magic’.

On a doorstep, Narcissus ‘Spellbinder’, ‘Hawera’ and ‘Tete-tete’ contrast with a blue glazed pot.

A pale blue grape hyacinth, Muscari ‘Valerie Finnis’ assorts well with the ground-hugging and slowly creeping Sedum ‘Angelina’.

The bright yellow new leaves of Spirea ‘Goldmound’ are a perfect foil for Spanish bluebells, Hyactinthoides hispanica ‘Excelsior’. As the spirea continues to grow it will hide the unsightly, dying bulb leaves.

Later in spring, after the early bulbs finish, lungworts known botanically as Pulmonaria provide many shades of blue. Their flowers can be white, blue, pink often fading from pink buds to blue flowers. Here a seedling combines with Deutzia gracilis ‘Duncan’, known under the trade name Chardonnay Pearls.

In May, the sky-blue blooms of an iris hybrid, I. tectorum x pallida shine brightly with the green/yellow flower heard of a Euphorbia characias hybrid called ‘Shorty’.

In a semi-shaded position, Camassia quamash ‘Orion’ is set off by a background of bold leaves from the Hosta ‘Choo Choo Train’.

More combinations to follow as we explore late May/June and July. - Gary

..make fine bed fellows. I realized this gardening season, that I am really attracted to the combination of blue and yellow, whether it be in foliage or flowers or in both. The two colors complement each other so well, with just the right amount of contrast and harmony. If you look closely, many blue flowers have a touch of yellow in them, be it a boss of stamens or a throat or an eye. I’ve got a garden with lots of shade, bright shade in most place but shade none-the-less. So tempted at times, I am, to push the extent of what I can grow with the little sunlight that shines upon my patch to add more flowering plants, but I’ve realized there are many plants that thrive in part-shade and fufill my lust for blue and yellow combinations. For one thing, yellow or blue leaves brighten up the shady areas injecting a brightness into otherwise dull shade where a plethora of green leaves dominates. As one acknowledges a penchant for a particular color scheme, suddenly you notice it popping up everywhere as you tour gardens and view old garden plants in a new light. This in turn gives you more inspiration and ideas for incorporating the color scheme into your garden, turning it into a theme.

Also, once you train your eye, you’ll notice the subtle ways Mother Nature has inserted a flash of yellow near the pollen producing areas of flowers, a signal to catch the eyes of pollinators (who, admittedly may be seeing the color or markings entirely different from how we humans, see them). In the above photo, of an Iris reticulata cultivar, the yellow marking leads to the stamens hidden below the upper part of its fall.

Anemone nemorosa flowers appear to have a yellow central eye due to the pollen-covered stamens. Notice how the base of each petal ends in white producing yet another ring of color. One could add some small-leaved hosta like ‘Kabitan’ or ‘Golden Tiara’ to inject some fresh yellow and green.

Look closely and you’ll see, the common forget-me-not, Myosotis sylvatica, has a golden yellow eye which brightens up the sky-blue petals. Here’s its backed by the freshly emerged leaves of Japanese  Hakone grass, Hakonechloa macra‘Aureola’ for a flower-foliage combination. Forget-me-nots will self-sow with abandon, if your soil is the slightest moist. Free plants are always welcome in my garden and young plants are easily transplanted to empty spots or pulled up in unwanted places. Most of all, they’ll surprise you by self-sowing themselves as in the combination above.

Tradescantia virginiana flowers have indigo feathered anthers and bright yellow stamens covered in pollen. Amazing to see the detail of this very common garden plant which can be a self-seeding thug, in a new light. I just pull up the seedlings where I don’t want them and cut the whole plant back upon flopping or when its finished blooming, which ever comes first!

Here’s a self-sown plant that put itself in just the right place as fas as my tastes are concerned. Wonderful to be greeted by the morning flowers while walking to the car in the morning and closed by one’s return later in the day.

Japanese Hakone grass spills out from under a Hydrangea ‘Bluebird’ laden with blooms. Although the hydrangea blooms are brief, the bright yellow of the grass lasts all season long. I use it as a repetitive element in the shadiest part of my garden and its color is most welcome.

Hydrangea ‘Lady in Red’ showing its blue side since my soil is acidic. It began as a white flower and had aged to blue over the past week. Here it is just beginning to show signs of blue. Hosta ‘Fragrant Bouquet’ grows under and along side its flower-laden stems.

Here’s subtlety for you! The sterile flowers are bright blue while the sterile florets are white (at this point, they will gain blue coloring as they age). Again Hakonechloa ‘All Gold’ peaks out from under the plant, adding its glow to the combination.

 There’s more to show concerning this blue and yellow scheme I’m exploring. More next time. - Gary

Some of my most favourite architectural plants are the giant Echium (from the Greek echis, viper - a reference to the coiled flowering stalks) from the Canary Islands. Unfortunately, not many of them are cold hardy here in the UK, and alas(!) they do not take kindly to permanent pot culture.  They are the sort of plant that divides the hopeful gardeners who will attempt growing them with a bit of protection (or the lucky ones with sheltered gardens who can!), from the pessimistic ones who won’t. Sadly, this past winter has been vexing for all our tender plants and the Canary Island Echium came through only in the most sheltered places.  Even in Cornwall, in the South West of the country where they are ubiquitous, many have been lost to the extreme weather.  So I felt lucky, to come across some impressive plants of Echium pininana in flower at the Inner Temple gardens in London a couple of weeks ago.  There they have, no doubt, benefited from warmth of the metropolis and survived unscathed.  Admittedly, Echium pininana is one of the hardier species. It is surprisingly cold tolerant for a plant from La Palma (one of the Canary Islands, which has a mild climate where temperatures never go below about 10ºC) and it does withstand several degrees of frost, if the onslaught is not too prolonged.  I have witnessed it survive -8ºC for short periods with no adverse effect.  It looks a sore sight crippled by hoarfrost, but it bounces back if temperatures rise above the freezing mark in the daytime.

It is a very easy thing to grow normally and although perversely rare in nature, it sets a lot of seeds in cultivation and often naturalizes itself about the place. Tresco Abbey Gardens, in the Isles of Scilly explode with an allegory of blue towers come late spring and it is a sight well worth the detour.  Same for Le Jardin Exotique de Roscoff in Bretagne, France.

Echium pininana is a monocarpic plant  (mono = one, karpos = fruit), which means that it only blooms once in its lifetime.  This sometimes happen in its second year, but more often than not, it only blooms in the third year.  It puts so much energy in the show that it literally flowers itself to death.  What a wonderful way to kill oneself!  It can really reach gigantic proportions; three meters is not unusual and four meters is quite possible in good soil. To achieve this, the ogre needs to be fed well though!  Stoke the bed with manure and wait patiently for the explosion!

Another towering monocarpic echium and one that I have had the joy of seeing in flower at Kew a couple of weeks ago is the red E. wildpretii. It is in my opinion, an even more dramatic plant than E. pininana.  It is shorter at one and a half meters, but what it lacks in height, it makes up in leaves.  Whilst the coarse fountain of leaves of E. pininana are interesting, they cannot compare in beauty with the magnificent woolly rosettes of E. wildpretii. It is the friendliest looking of things, with narrow grey hoary leaves arranged in a swirling pattern, paling slightly towards the centre. One is as naturally drawn to it as a cozy pillow, but beware if you touch it, for the leaves have tiny hairs that irritate the skin.  The rosette is so beautiful that it is almost a disappointment to see it turning into a flower stalk!  But what a striking sight once the flowers open and cover the spike with their dark pink to red flowers (it tends to be paler in cultivation for some strange reason)! It is very fleeting but mesmerizing. Like E. pininana, it will flower itself to oblivion, to be pollinated by an army of bees that love its nectar and then set abundant seeds to ensure a continuum.

Echium wildpretii is amazingly amenable to cultivation considering where it comes from; one rather inhospitable place, the south slope of Mount Teide, Tenerife. It grows at about 1800 meters of altitude, in the old caldera of the ancient volcano, where few other things survive the extremes of this lunar landscape. I saw it there a year and a half ago and despite being battered by the wind and cold, the brave thing seemed perfectly happy growing in the dry volcanic soil. At that altitude, it must endure repeated frosts at night, and even the occasional snowfall so one would assume it must be quite hardy. Not so here. It grows beautifully the first summer, but doesn’t like our balmy, moist, unpredictable winter and usually rots away before the return of spring, if left to its own devices.  One should cover it with a cloche, straw, or fleece, whatever is at hand  - and pray. Or go see it in the Princess of Wales Conservatory at Kew Gardens, where it is right at home.

As both Echium pininana and Echium wildpretii flower at the same time, and often in the same garden, hybrids occur and they are meant to be quite interesting.  They are usually intermediate in shape and colour, but as far as I understand, there is considerable variation. I took a photograph of what I think it such a hybrid called ‘Pink Fountain’ in the Inner Temple gardens in London this year.  Isn’t it a treat? - Phillipe

Quince has a mellifluous ring when mouthed from the lips. I never savored a quince until I came to Tasmania, but when my taste buds acquainted themselves with one, I was seduced. Just as the Chinese celebrated the peaches of immortality consumed every one thousand years by the deities, the ancient Europeans embraced quinces, coveted by the Greek and Roman gods in the guise of golden apples. The quince aroused jealousies among Aphrodite, Athena, and Hera, all of who wooed Paris with offers of the most beautiful woman for marriage, wisdom, and power and strength. It slowed down the formidable Atlanta in the infamous race where hapless suitors lost their heads. As part of the Twelve Labors, Hercules was summoned to slay the serpent guarding the quince tree in the Garden of the Hesperides.

Not to be confused with the flowering quince (Chaenomeles) whose fruits do produce reasonable jams or preserves, the quince of antiquity is a deciduous tree no more than 8 m tall from Caucasus and scientifically known as Cydonia oblonga. The quince has two glorious seasons –in spring when the leaves have that verdant greenness overlaid with downy gray coating and the single five-petaled, white flowers unfurl, and in autumn when the branches are groaning underneath the weight of the radiant golden fruits. When I lived in Boston, USA, there was a sizable tree in the rose family beds at the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University where the flowers and fruits often intrigued me, but not enough to explore cooking them. Long-lived trees are presumably rare in North America because fire blight, a bacterial disease, often devastates them at a certain point. No immortal sacredness or blessing would guard the tree of golden apples against this disease.

Modern convenience has deemed the quince an anachronism amidst apples, bananas, and oranges, which fulfill the time-hurried person’s qualifications for minimal preparation and consumption. The quince resists fresh consumption and assaults those foolish enough to try with its astringency and hardness. It requires one to abide his or her time slowly through cooking, and those who do the waiting are rewarded with the honeyed, but tart fragrance.

Latin cultures often process the quince, known as membrillo in Spanish, into dulce de membrillo, which is traditionally paired with Manchego cheese. Middle Eastern countries have favored it in their cuisine. The Lebanese, calling it sfarjel, consume it as a jam. The Syrians slow cook quince, known as kibbeh safarjah, into pomegranate paste (dibs rouman) with shank meat and kibbeh (a savory pie with burghul and mince meat).  Iranians either prefer it be raw or in stews and jam, and like their neighbors Afghans, sometimes apply the seeds as a remedy for pneumonia and lung disease.

In serious food circles, Australians have embraced the quince as a versatile component of salads, cooked meats, and desserts. Skim through the food magazines between late autumn and winter, and there is bound to be one or two recipes calling for quinces. Maggie Beer and Stephanie Alexander, two of Australia’s top food proponents, have enthused about quinces in their writings – the former enamored enough to dream and plant a quince orchard in her Barossa farmhouse property and the latter in drinking quince wine on an iced frappe in France. Where gardens and orchards have fallen into disrepair and neglect in Australia, quince trees typically persist well untended. Quinces can be found in specialist markets and good greengrocers, although it is best to befriend someone who has a thriving tree with fruits, but is oblivious to their culinary value. Two months ago, I watched my housemate embark energetically on a quince quest, acquiring and purchasing all the quinces he would, in order to poach and preserve them in jars. We picked several fruits at a New Norfolk farm, and I nearly mistook them for yellow apples, if not for their distinctive, pineapple shapes. Placed on the counter at home, the quinces glowed golden in the late afternoon light filtering into the kitchen. Peeling away their skins uncovered their creamy, nearly impenetrable flesh with pips. The peeled slices were then covered with water, verjuice, sugar, and assorted spices. Simmering for hours in the heavy saucepans, the cooked quinces began to unleash their signature scents in the warm kitchen, and for days, the kitchen was wonderfully perfumed with spiced quinces. It brought to mind that the tip I was given by a dear British friend of mine, who would place a quince to ‘aerate’ an unused corner of her musty wardrobe.

Quinces Poached in Verjuice (adapted from Maggie’s Harvest by Maggie Beer)
5-8 quinces (depending on size)
Juice of 1 lemon
Sugar, to taste (optional)
3 cups (750 ml) verjuice

Preheat the oven to 180◦C (350◦F). Peel and core the quinces. Cut each cone into 8 wedges, putting them into a bowl of water acidulated with lemon juice as you go to prevent discolouration. If you are using sugar, simmer it with the verjuice on a medium heat for approximately 20 minutes to begin to form a syrup. Poach the quince in the oven with the verjuice and sugar (if using), in a large, flat baking dish until cooked through. (The cooking time will depend on the variety and ripeness of the fruit.) the fruit should be soft to the touch but still intact and will not be the deep red of long-cooked quince. Once cooked, put the quince with the syrup into a pan and, over high heat, reduce the verjuice until both the fruit and verjuice caramelize—turn the slices of fruit over once the first side has caramelized.

NOTE: Verjuice is unfermented grape juice, which can be bought in good delis and foodstores. It is not the same as commercial grape juice sold for daily consumption.

A good selection of quince recipes can be found on Skye Gyngell’s daily column for the British paper Independent. - Eric

Naturalists take note, Euell Gibbons had the sense to title his book, “Stalking the Wild Asparagus”, a far more catchier title than this blog entry’s moniker. The effect though is the same, calling attention to an edible plant you won’t find at the corner grocer, as its available for a limited time only in selected landscapes. You’ll have to locate this one cultivated in our gardens.

While visiting a friend’s garden last spring, surreptitiously eyeing up the succulent, new, red stems of the rhubarb, I just had to pay homage to Wisteria sinensis in its full spring-time glory - its’ luscious pale-lavender, pea flowers born in great profusion, in long trusses. Its always a horticultural moment that makes one truly be amazed at the beauty of nature. From seemingly lifeless wooden stems, buds appear, rapidly fatten with promise until over night they seem to elongate into the most eye-catching of clusters. Who can’t be stopped in their tracks by the sight of a mature climber in its full glory?

Imagine my surprise, when my friend Meg told me her family would batter-coat the flowers, deep fry them and eat them.  A rite of Spring of sorts - just like hunting dandelion greens and eating them as a spring tonic or harvesting native fern croziers and boiling them for a “green”. Now, I thought she was teasing me…because she was onto my rhubarb lust and was trying to divert my interest in her first rhubarb harvest. I knew for a fact the seeds of Wisteria are poisonous containing glycosoides not simpatico with human anatomy. “No”, she insisted, “Its the truth”. I should have known better, Quakers don’t lie.

Later that evening, I jumped on the information highway and lo and behold…there are recipes and references for fried wisteria blossoms, several in fact. Also, soup, salad and wisteria flower pancakes and even wisteria wine made with fresh flowers!

Last year, I got caught up in the frenzy that Spring in the garden can be, and missed my chance to try it for fun. But this year, as I see the buds swell my thoughts turn to frying some up. - Gary 

PS: Please do not ever attempt to eat the seeds of Wisteria as they are deadly poisonous!

Lucky I am, that my travels take me to some of the finest gardens in England. Great Britain is a cornucopia of gardens. No other country has such a high density of gardens, talented gardeners or knowledgeable plant specialists. For many years the amazing horticulture has been the draw for me to go there, aside from spending time with my wonderful English friends. Once in a while,  ‘garden hopping’ you visit a garden in that great green isle which stands out from the clamoring crowd of gardens vying for your attention. One such is Bourton House, Bourton-on-the-Hill, Gloucestershire, England. 

The imposing, stone manor stands in the center of the gardens with a large, green lawn behind it. In every direction you’ll find good horticultural practices employed in a variety of garden areas. Nary a weed in sight.

Its the kind of garden you absorb, and its’ impression stays with you long afterwards. If not for its shear creativity, but for its exacting level of high standards of maintenance. One leaves the garden totally enthused, heady with new thoughts and ideas to apply to your own garden. Or your ready to throw in the proverbial garden spade, leaving others who have gardening staff to create such grand visions of beauty.  I find there’s always some small detail, combination or design motif, one can borrow from even the grandest of gardens and apply them to one’s own humble patch of earth. 

A variation on the traditional herb garden, no four-square boxwood-edged beds here! Interesting switch on the classic parterre. Note the variegated horseradish plant confined to a large container as a central feature. Excellent way to keep what can be a spreading plant in its place. 

Far from only traditional elements, the occasional dash of contemporary design is used an accent in the gardens, too. Note the glass spheres “floating” above the foliage of a purple-leaved cotinus bush. 

Bourton House has established a reputation for its wonderful container plantings. Practically every garden space has an example with its confines. Here a very large over-scaled, stone urn sit prominently on a stone terrace beneath the rear facade of the house.  

Detail of warm color scheme of a hanging basket. Can you count the number of different plants jammed into this mix?

The front garden of the manor house features boxwood trimmed and set out in the most fantastical of patterns, all on axis with the front door of the house and located across the semi-circular drive.    

Metal arbors at the far edge of the garden give the eye a place to rest as well as one’s bum. Brilliantly colored stained glass panels show artistic detail at every level.  

Common houseplants mixed in uncommon ways make for an interesting container combination in a paved courtyard.

Attention to detail under foot, too.

If you get the chance to visit this garden gem, please do. Kudos to owner, Monique Paice and her talented staff of gardeners! - Gary 

Please note: according to their website, Bourton House Gardens are NOT open to the general public in 2009, however they are open to pre-booked groups. For those gardeners travelling in the Cotwolds, looking for a unique place to stay, Bourton House offers two places to stay within its grounds. Their website has details on how to book accommodation.

Certain plants herald a season more than others, for instance the blooms of colchicums in September, are a sign of the onset of autumn. The first sight of the winter aconite in February, is a glimmer of a spring to come. For me, one plant that says spring has arrived and is here to stay, is the delicate Fritillaria thunbergii. Its one of those quick-to-emerge plants that bolt out of the earth, give a fine show and then quietly fade away for yet another year. And I wouldn’t want to garden without it.

I’ll always associate this plant with a garden mentor of mine. Early on in my gardening career, Sydney Eddison  introduced me to the above fritillaria as Fritillaria verticillata as its been named as in the past. Thankfully, people’s names rarely change but with plants, many we know under one name can be sorted out by the Higher Powers of Botany as something else and given a new name. In any case, its the plant that’s important. The moment Sydney toured me around her spring garden back in 1989 and my eyes lit upon this delicate treasure, I knew it was a special plant. It seemed so exotic in nature, so unlike any other common bulb like tulip or crocus. More like a plant one would see in the alpine frames at Kew or the alpine house at Wisley in England. Here was such a treasure growing outdoors in the cold New England climate! This plant had style and grace, not unlike the lady who gladly shared a division with me upon seeing my enthusiasm for it. Life has dictated many moves since then but I’ve managed to keep in my garden. Its blooming presently and I must admit I’ll always think of Sydney when its in flower. Such are the powerful bonds that we gardeners can share.

Fritillaria thunbergii hails from Asia, China and Japan and is one of multitude of plants named by/and/or for The Swedish botanist, Carl Per Thunberg. While in Japan in the later part of the 1700’s, he had access to many plants new to him and to the Western horticulture. With his contacts, he got many of them into cultivation. Today, The Flora of China states it is not from Japan naturally, but escaped from cultivation into the wild. Also, it mentions bamboo forest as its habitat. I can assure you it thrives in partly shaded areas in the garden, be it shade from bamboo or the deciduous forest common here on the east coast of the United States.

So what draws me to this horticultural gem, namely its’ upright stature, so elegantly elongated, its’ upright stems that hold the somewhat shy appearing, bowing flowers which upon further inspection are checkered in the most dainty fashion, an odd mix of butter and bronze. Not to mention the leaves which radiate out from its central stem (hence the synonym specific name of verticillata), each leaf curled ever so neatly as wanting to grasp onto other plants. When you combine all of these features, you’ve got a real gem of a plant. - Gary

PS: The latest issue of Gardens Illustrated arrived today and lo and behold, this Frit is the cover!

The 2009 Philadelphia Flower Show “Bella Italia” is now but a memory, existing only in digitized pics and pixels, or embedded in the neurons of the many visitors that entered for one week in early March. This year’s Italian theme lent itself gracefully to the contrivance that is a flower show. As one expected, there was a plethora of neo-classical references with columns, pergolas, colonnades, axial views, bits of Venice, Florence, Lake Maggiore, etc - a Fodor’s travel guide packed into the Philadelphia Convention Center. Practically every region of the boot-shaped country was featured in and amongst the many gardens, landscapes or floral displays. Special-built architecture provided a drama that seemed to be missing in previous shows and gave a good strong background for the gardens to play against. The “forcing” geniuses who do their floral trickery each winter brought summer annuals to full voluptuousness, vegetables to ripe fruition and spring bulbs alive - forget that outside a raging snowstorm blew mightily the first weekday of the show. While a preview of the coming gardening year’s earthly delights beckons me to begin anew, the gardens as a whole still leave me feeling cold, contrived as they are, and try as they may, to be “real” gardens.

At the other end of the floral spectrum are the floral designers who seem to be given more floor space year after year. Their displays are all about contrivance, make no mistake! They are not trying to be potted gardens disguised in a “landscape”. And to their credit, the floral designers take the theme most years and stretch the limits of creativity. And I for one applaud them. After all a flower “show” should have entertainment value, stimulate thought and ideas, and engage the visitor on many levels.

I can think of no other display at the 2009 show that embodied sheer human creativity to such a degree, taking plants and flowers and using them in wholly unique and interpretive ways, than the fantasy created by Moda Botanica.

There seemed to be a lot of buzz among the horticultural cognoscenti that this was the most alluring and fantastic of displays at the show. I’ll admit when I came upon it on the Friday while it was still being put together I fell under its spell, mesmerized by the color scheme and layer upon layer of detail (which only got more complex by Saturday’s opening to Pennsylvania Horticultural Society members). I noticed Saturday attendees, digital cameras drawn, exploring each nook and cranny, trying to perceive this strange new landscape laid before them.

To my mind this avant-garde(n!) was an abstract portrayal of the classical Italian Renaissance garden, the yellow-twig dogwood branches forming an allee which framed a “water feature” complete with an internal “grotto”. Its grid-like metal structure gave it all a steely cold edge and the color palette of grays, blues, silvers and purples only heightened the effect. Perhaps? Or maybe, the viewer was meant to wonder the ruins of the lost continent of Atlantis as jellyfish like creations were seemingly suspended in the flotsam and jetsam of Spanish moss. Whatever it was, the whole thing pulsed with life.

Plastic water bottles used as vases, floral water tubes disguised with threads, fabric bits woven with plant material, twig balls, Spanish moss orbs, Tillandsia xerographica en masse, roses so drained of color they appeared ghostly, etiolated amaryllis shoots reaching upward due to geotropism, upended flower bulbs, phalanxes of yellow-twig dogwood made pointy with zip ties, vanda orchids liked paved jewels… these are images that captured my imagination and were borne out of the creative team at Moda Botanica.  - Gary

To read more about their creation and see more images visit:

http://modabotanicadesign.blogspot.com/